Punk rock baby

Tom Pinney

I now have more friends with children than I do without.

This is a bit of a sobering concept. I never really thought I would get to this point, but here I am, and I know a lot of people who are parents.

Just last week, my church got word that our youth pastor and his wife welcomed their first child. Facebook is now flooded with pictures of the baby.

It may be a little shameful that my favorite picture of their baby is the one where their dog is sniffing it.

Actually, it’s me, If you’re ashamed that this is my favorite picture of their child, the one that includes the dog, then you haven’t been paying attention. In which case, hi, I’m Tom, and I’m still not too sure I ever want kids.

But here’s the thing: the kid is cute. I’ll admit that I did let out an “aww” when I first saw the baby in a picture.

The kid had a mohawk, though. No more than a few hours in this world and she’s already a punk rock icon, and you can’t not find that cute.

Note that my stance on whether or not I have children hasn’t changed yet. I take note of the fact that the new mother is always tired, that the new dad hasn’t gotten a full night’s sleep in awhile, and that their entire life revolves around this little baby full of spit, vomit, and other germy things.

I don’t want any of that mess.

However, I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t started to come around to that way of thinking.

There are still so many things precluding me from actually coming around, the most obvious of which being that I am still happily living the single lifestyle. I wouldn’t say no to a relationship right now, but I do like being able to sit back on a Saturday morning when I have no news to cover and play some video games.

Plus, the last time I was on a blind date, the Bull’s Eye Trading was still a Casey’s. And boy, was I lost.

There are a lot of other little obstacles to me having kids, such as the fact that they’re covered in germs, they never stop pooping, they’re kind of selfish, and it’s really hard to communicate with them for a long time, but the biggest one is fear. And there are a lot of sides to this fear.

I know a lot of people who are hugging the children they have knowing that they should have more, but lost one or more children due to miscarriages. I know others who have yet to have a successful pregnancy.

I would be inconsolable if I wanted kids but then couldn’t have one successfully carried to term, and yet the women who have suffered miscarriages are still contributing to society and doing so proudly and confidently, despite the deep grief they have.

If that happened to me, I wouldn’t be at work for a long while. And how would I console my wife after something like that happened?

Deeper than that, I know people who have lost children at very young ages. That kind of thing would absolutely kill me.

But deeper than all of that is a fear of genetics.

Cards on the table: I have three diagnosed mental illnesses, including major depressive disorder, generalized anxiety disorder, and post-traumatic stress disorder. Two of those can be hereditary.

Which means that, if I have kids, they have a high probability of suffering from MDD and GAD just as badly, if not worse, than I do.

I wouldn’t wish these things on an enemy. At the worst, I’d pray they couldn’t find their shoes before traversing a room full of Legos, but I would never wish they suffered like I did.

How in the world would I be able to bring kids into this world knowing that they would likely turn out like me? I wouldn’t be able to forgive myself for knowingly bringing children into this world that would suffer like I have.

And if I were them, I don’t know if I would forgive me for it either.

I know this goes a lot darker and deeper than this column usually goes, but it’s necessary because I’m finding that, even for myself, just saying “I don’t want kids” isn’t enough. Because every time I say it, someone says “You’ll change your mind for the right person,” or “You don’t know what you’ll want a few years down the road,” or “You’ll regret it if you don’t have kids,” or “You were a kid once, you should reproduce too!”

So, there it is. The full, unabridged story of why exactly I don’t want kids.

Maybe someday, I’ll be able to overcome those fears. Maybe they’ll stick with me forever and I’ll never be able to get over them.

Maybe I’ll adopt children who are considered too old to adopt and stuck in the foster care system. Or maybe, I’ll just adopt a whole bunch of dogs and spend the rest of my days scratching them in that good spot right behind their ears.

Maybe I’ll even do both. Who knows. I’m not a Time Lord.

But I did get a little excited about the idea of adopting a lot of dogs.

You’re right, I don’t know what I’ll want in ten years, five years, or even one year. But I do know that, if I don’t get over these fears, my chances of wanting children will continue to decrease.

I also know that, every time someone gives that kind of response to the phrase “I don’t want kids,” they make people like me less likely to want kids. Because I don’t like being this vulnerable even in private.

Tom Pinney is a news reporter for the Maryville Daily Forum